


Three Times Christine and the Courier Held Hands

by forgetcanon



Series: old world blues and new world hope [3]
Category: Fallout: New Vegas
Genre: Blood, F/F, Nightmares, it opens with a super fun description of being locked in an auto-doc
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-06-17
Updated: 2016-06-17
Packaged: 2018-07-15 14:43:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,142
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7226647
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/forgetcanon/pseuds/forgetcanon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Sounded like you hurt yourself on that wall there," Lautner said, tone mild. "Mind if I take a look?"</p>
<p>Three times Christine and the Courier held hands, and one time they didn't.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Three Times Christine and the Courier Held Hands

_let me out let me out let me out-_

It was pitch black, there was no one in the Sierra Madre to hear her but the ghost people, she’d be stuck inside it forever- stuck inside it with the _machine_ , the one she couldn’t _feel_ slicing her but she _knew_ it was happening, knew she was anesthetized and she’d long ago lost the ability to scream for help, her voice snipped away, snapping in the middle of her first screams, sewing and cutting and sewing and cutting-

_someone had to come someone had to-_

Her hand burst through the wall of the autodoc with a crunch. Christine flung herself to the side-  _let me out let me out-_  and she landed on the floor. A dusty floor. Her hand screeched in pain and Christine jumped up to defend herself, where was she-

A light clicked on.

Lautner's pip-boy light.

They were in an apartment, in the east side of the Sierra Madre. She was out of that thing, there was no anesthesia here and she could feel her hand throbbing and her back aching and she wasn’t there anymore. She shuddered, rising to a crouch. She wasn't there anymore. 

"You alright?"

Christine nodded. Worked her jaw. It stopped where it was meant to, stretched no further, and hurt when she bit her cheek. Her left hand was cold against her throat, tracing the closed scars frantically. She wasn't there. She wasn't in there.

Her right hand was bleeding, though. Christine let herself had one more shudder, one more grateful breath, before she rose and looked for their packs. Her sweat was cold in the breeze of her movement.

"Sounded like you hurt yourself on that wall there," Lautner said, tone mild. She sat up on the couch, aiming her pip-boy light at the wall. It still reflected enough off the pale paint that Christine glanced at the window. They'd covered it with a spare blanket folded over four times to account for its holes- nothing drew Ghost People so fast as unnatural lights- but there were still gaps.

Well, they were on the second floor, with Dog asleep on the first. They'd hear it from here if anything tried to investigate the light. (Though who knew how _God_ would react to ghost people trying to break in.)

Lautner saw her glance and covered the light with her hand so that only a sliver peeked out. "Mind if I take a look?"

Christine rolled her eyes, shrugged. Lautner had designated herself team medic, but her tone said team _mom_. She still obediently held out her hand as Lautner leaned forward, the two of them assessing the damage with practiced eyes.

Lautner _tssked_ at the ragged skin and chunks of plaster and wood. "Of all the walls you had to go and punch, you picked one of the many, many decomposing ones.” She shined her light on said wall- Her pip-boy light glimmered on the rusted pipes exposed by the fist-sized hole. “C’mon, let's go take care of this away from a window."

The apartment's kitchen was mercifully window-free, the air clear except for the dust they kicked up. Earlier, Lautner had checked the lamps and found that one still worked, guttering on its fiber's last strands. Now she flicked it on, replacing the cool green light of her pipboy with wavering yellow that brought out the warm tones in her skin and the faded paint of the kitchen table.

Christine sat, bloody hand curled against the table, sluggishly dripping blood onto the dust. She'd had far worse. She didn't really need Lautner's help treating this, either, but it would be easier than doing it by herself, one-handed. (And, if she was being honest, having it treated made it feel more like a wound and less like a bit of idiocy. She'd _punched a wall_ in her _sleep_.)

Lautner unrolled their rudimentary first aid kit and automatically began correcting the placement of her tools in the cloth as she searched for the one she wanted.

Christine had watched her picking through the medical clinic looking for the tools she had now. Despite her eagerness to get the hell away from that place, part of her had been instantly relieved, some inground training that trusted and worshipped the squad medic.

And then Elijah had told them that Lautner would be coordinating his orders. Lautner was here for the same reason as anyone who came to the Sierra Madre: She was _after_ something. Soft-spoken and kind as she may have been, she was also a killer and had a sharp intelligence tucked away behind her eyes. 

Lautner picked the tweezers out of their fold, laid them on the edge of the cloth, and held out her hand for Christine's. 

Lautner's hand was calloused and warm, her grip gentle as she turned Christine's knuckles to see the damage. It wasn't that bad, really, but the last thing any of them needed was their techie to lose a hand to infection. 

She felt like a child again, holding out a scrape for the inspection of Scribe Fairweather, who'd that always managed to get his hands on something sweet for the roughtumble kids that were too young yet to be Squires but old enough to make their own trouble.

That scribe was in the Mojave, now, either dead because Elijah's mad fixation on HELIOS had gotten him shot or buried underground because the NCR were dead-set on rooting out every last son and daughter of steel.

"Well, I won't have to amputate," Lautner said dryly. Christine snorted. "Want something for the pain? This'll sting."

Christine shook her head. Maybe a bit too vehemently, by the way Lautner's gaze narrowed and lingered. Whatever conclusion Lautner had drawn from that, she shrugged, picked up the tweezers, and said, "In that case, want a belt to bite?"

Lautner's voice didn't change with the joke- she was already looking for a splinter to pull.

Christine rolled her eyes and fought back a smile. It was the sort of thing Veronica would have said- Lautner sharply tugged a shard of wood out of the skin between her middle and fourth finger. Christine winced. She was right- it did _sting_.

"Punching Elijah in your sleep?" Lautner asked.

Christine shrugged.

"Me, too." Her voice had a tone of vagueness in it as she made small talk, her mind really focused on the tweezers in her hand. "Had a dream I was fighting a bear, and it turned into five bears, on fire. No joke."

_I believe you_ , Christine wanted to say. _That sort of symbolism is just the kind of thing this place brings up_. She didn't know how she could communicate _Freud_ , though. She was pretty sure Lautner wouldn't even know who that was.

So Christine just raised an eyebrow.

Lautner frowned at her work, picking out another splintery chunk.  "Usually when I'm doing this kind of thing, I have the other person talk to me. You'd be surprised what people will tell you, while you're stitching up their leg or setting a broken bone. Guess that won't work here. Had a guy who'd got his leg caught in a bear trap, once, told me he was on his way back from cheating with his wife..."

Lautner went into a soothing patter, voice soft and even. Her accent, usually weak and uneven, steadied out into something vaguely southern, gentle and tarnished by time. Was she from the south? 

Christine leaned in, trying to get Lautner's eye. The old cowboy glanced up. "Something wrong?"

Christine pointed at Lautner.

Lautner's eyebrows rose. "You're going to have to be more specific."

Christine made a talking gesture with her free hand and pointed at Lautner again.

"Talk about myself?"

Christine nodded.

Lautner thought about that, eyes going left and jaw working as though she was searching for some stuck food. "Well," she said, drawing out the syllable. "I've been a courier since I was fifteen." Given the crow's feet and grey hairs in her short-cropped brown curls, Christine guessed that had been a _while_ ago.

Searching for another innocent fact, Lautner's eyes dropped back to Christine's hand in hers. She angled it back and forth again and spread Chrisine's fingers in search of stray shards and dust. "Walked pretty much the whole of NCR territory, from Klamato to Baja Terra-" (She pronounced it correctly, even rolling the _rr_ a little.)

She stopped and sat back, head cocked. Christine sat up, too. Movement in the hall. Quiet, though, not the ghost people. 

Dean poked his head through the door, then quickly ducked through and closed the door behind him, shutting the light in their little room. "And what are you two up to at this time of night? I was under the impression that we all needed our beauty sleep for tomorrow's show- _some_ of us more than others." 

"We're holding hands and talking about our feelings," Lautner said, raising Christine's hand in hers. "Care to join us?"

Domino pointed at Christine's wound. "And how'd that happen?"

"The wall bad-mouthed Christine. She took exception."

Christine suppressed a smile- Domino wouldn't react to it well. 

He tried to act like he was in charge, like some kind of second-in-command, but Dog answered to Elijah and God had some strange affinity for Lautner, which meant that Lautner decided where they went and what they did, whether or not Domino liked it. And he _didn't_ like it.

Oh, Lautner conceded to his "expertise" often enough- Dean was the one who'd guided them to this sealed-off place, after all- but Dean only had the power Lautner gave him and the concessions to his pride burned it more than they salved it. 

Still, he was dangerous. Had to be, to have survived the Sierra Madre for so long. Christine sometimes found herself glad of the collars around all of their throats, because otherwise Domino would be a wily enemy. The traps he pointed them around were proof of that.

"Getting into brawls at this time of night?" Domino asked, snide as always. "Careful that you don't permanently damage your hands, we'll need those inside the Madre."

"Dean, darling," Lautner said, so close on the heels of his sentence that she was _almost_ interrupting. There was no fondness in the way she said 'darling.' "Do you know where we can scrounge up some antiseptic?"

Dean snorted. "If there's one thing that's easy to find in these parts, it's alcohol. I'll be right back."

When he turned his back, Christine rolled her eyes. Lautner waited until Dean had actually shut the door before she widened hers in silent agreement.

'Dean, darling,' Christine mouthed.

Lautner snickered. "Well, whatever works. Pretty sure I got all the splinters out, do you feel anything I missed?"

Christine took her hand back and flexed it. (If Lautner noticed some of Christine's blood had pooled in the palm of her own hand, she didn't acknowledge it.) Making a fist stung, but she didn't feel any splinters. She nodded in approval.

"Yes, you feel something I missed, or yes, I did a good job."

Christine smiled and nodded again. Lautner gave her a flat look until she made a "two" with her other hand.

"Good. Now, the fun part's coming up."

Over at the sink, Lautner used as little of their purified water as she could to wash out the wound while Christine winced at both the waste and the pain. Domino came back just as she was finishing. "Well, if that's how you want to waste your water, it doesn't matter to me."

Lautner took a sip from the bottle and handed it to Christine. "Did you find something?"

"Yeah." He tossed over a bottle of vodka that was only half-full. While Lautner made a face at the broken seal, he took a seat on the edge of one of the chairs they'd vacated. "On some poor bastard's nightstand. At least him needing a nip to get to sleep makes our lives easier."

Lautner shook her head, held a scrap of bandage over the mouth of the bottle, and tipped it. Apparently she'd decided that there was no point in worrying about the sterility of her sterilizer. "About the water, we have enough chips to buy water for weeks, even if you wanted some of ours. The only problem is carrying it."

"And getting to a vending machine," Domino added. "Ghost people don't like loitering by them, but they sure do pay attention to the streets nearby."

"I'll keep that in mind," Lautner said. She pushed the bottle into Christine's other hand, uncapped- _want a swig before I get started?_ \- and began sterilizing when Christine sat it on the counter.

Christine gritted her teeth and pressed her nails into her left palm to distract her from the burning in her right. Lautner wasn't gentle with the cloth. When she started at the deep gouge between her fingers, Christine hissed through her teeth.

"Sorry," Lautner said, but didn't let up.

Domino leaned back in his chair and crossed his legs at the ankles. "That auto-doc really did a number on you, didn't it? At least we don't have to worry about you yelping and bringing the town down on us."

Christine's nails dug into her palm. Her face felt hot enough to radiate in the cool room. Years of training told her to leave the room, cool off, preserve squad integrity- but Lautner was still working on her hand.

At least that meant Christine could stay facing the counter and that she _couldn't_ whirl around and punch Domino right in his stupid fucking glasses. Domino was an asshole. She wouldn't be working with him for long- it was only a matter of time until they got inside and got close to Elijah. She could deal with him until then. The rough burn of Lautner's antiseptic work was a good distraction as she worked herself down. 

Lautner's voice was cool and even as she asked, "Were you a comedian before the war?"

Domino scoffed. "Don't like my jokes?"

"Not much, no." Lautner stopped her cleaning for a moment to inspect Christine's hand with the light before getting back to it. "But I know a guy back in New Vegas, name of Hadrian. _He's_ a comedian. If we get out of this, I'll introduce you two." Her voice went thoughtful. "Now _that_ would be a show...."

" _New_ Vegas?" Domino sounded like he'd tasted something bitter. "Is that what Las Vegas is calling herself these days? _New_ Vegas?" 

"From what I understand, it's not much different than Old Vegas." Lautner put just enough emphasis on 'old' to make Domino groan softly in disdain. "Casinos, corruption, and caps."

" _Bottlecaps_ ," Domino muttered. "Forgot that, that you people use _bottlecaps_ nowadays."

"It's a brave new world outside the Madre," Lautner continued, as though he hadn't spoken. "I'm looking forward to getting whatever's inside the Madre and then never, _ever_ coming back. How about you?"

"Well..." Domino said, and trailed off. "Let's focus on the getting inside, yeah? Once we manage that, _then_ we can daydream about what comes after."

Christine nodded, not that either of them were looking at her.

"Alright. Bandages. Most of this is superficial, but we should cover the deeper ones." Lautner yawned into the heel of her hand as she turned and found their precious gauze and tape. "And then back to bed. Do Ghost People sleep?"

Domino hesitated. "Well... I've never seen them do it. Not that I seek out their nests, mind you. They don't seem to prefer any hours of the day, which is what's important- day's only better for us because we don't need lights to get around."

Lautner nodded and made a shooing gesture. Domino resisted for a long moment before he sighed and got up. Lautner took his chair and Christine crossed around to the other. The blood she'd dripped on the table was nearly dry and there were several spots clear of dust from where Lautner had leaned her elbows. 

Domino crossed over, took their place by the counter, absent-mindedly put the cap back on the vodka bottle. "Well, this has been _fun_. Go team, and all that. If we're done gossiping, I'm headed back to bed."

"Good night, Dean," Lautner said.

"Good night, Lottie-darling. Good night, techie." 

Christine civilly nodded her head. 

Domino took the bottle and his leave, shutting the door behind him silently. 

Christine mimed firing a gun after him.

"Not while we have these collars on," Lautner muttered, carefully cutting gauze into narrow strips. "Wish I knew your name, by the way. Sure you wouldn't be able to write it if we got you a pen? Muscle-memory?"

Christine honestly wasn't sure, but they didn't _have_ a pen. 

"It's not something you can sign out somehow?" Lautner asked. "No famous people with your name you can impersonate?"

Actually... 

Christine sat up straight to get Lautner's attention, then made a _one_ with her finger and tapped it on her wrist. Please let Lautner have played charades as a child...

"...One word?" Lautner said hesitantly. "Your name?"

Christine nodded. Royce would be harder to get- maybe she could try with Rolls-Royce?- but that would be too complicated. She made a _two_  with her fingers and tapped it on the inside of her elbow.

"Two syllables?"

Christine nodded again and pretended to pray.

"Praying... church-related?"

Yes.

"Mary? Maria?"

No. Two syllables.

"Got it. Hmm." Lautner had finished cutting the strips she wanted, but she held off, more interested in their game. She was leaning forward, gaze intent and focused despite her tired blinking. "Eden?"

Christine shook her head and mimed being hung on a cross. 

Lautner squinted, sounding very hesitant. "Je...sus?"

How hard was it to jump from Christ to Christine? Christine made a "go on" gesture.

"Jesus Christ?"

Two.

"The second one, okay- _Chris_?"

Yes!

"That's the first syllable? Chris... Christine?"

_Yes!_

Lautner beamed. "Christine. Nice to meet you, Christine. Can't believe we didn't do this earlier. Now gimme your hand." 

She bound her hand lightly with the gauze and tape, warning Christine not to get them dirty or to tear them off, because they didn't have enough to re-bind her hand and have some on hand in case of an _actual_ emergency. Christine tested her hand in the bandages. Her fingers were mostly free and even with the gauze between them she could grip easily, if not comfortably. She nodded her thanks as Lautner packed her kit back up.

"Don't mention it," Lautner said, yawning again. She flicked off the light.

In the darkness of the bedroom, Lautner repacked her bag and lay down on the couch again. Christine lay on the wide bed with her arms out-stretched and flexed her hand to feel the ache.

I'm not in there anymore. I'm not in there anymore. 

**Author's Note:**

> This started as a good fun time with Lautner and Christine getting a bit gay and ended as a great time with Domino getting bullied. More to come on this theme, probably. 
> 
> 1) Lautner runs HH before DM, simply because I really don't like running Dead Money, and especially not on a low level. From a Watsonian perspective, Lautner skips town after killing Mr. House by joining up the the caravan.
> 
> 2) I tried to emphasize Christine's Brotherhood upbringing and mentality. They're very much a military organization and while I chose to write Christine as less hostile to outsiders, she's still a bit patronizing.
> 
> 3) _Fuck_ Dean Domino, honestly. I have a few different drafts of replies to _that comment_ he makes. My favorite:   
>  Domino leaned back in his chair and crossed his legs at the ankles. "That auto-doc really did a number on you, didn't it? At least we don't have to worry about you yelping and bringing the town down on us."  
>  Lautner paused for only a moment before setting the bandage aside. "Dean, stand up for a second."  
>  Dean stood. Lautner whirled, grabbed his shoulders, and pulled him sharply into her knee.  
>  "How's that for yelping?" she said.   
>  Domino curled up on the ground and cried.
> 
> 4) I'm not sure if the rules for charades are consistent even in different classes in the same school, let alone across two centuries and an apocalypse, but let's pretend they are.


End file.
